Virginia Beach Arts and Humanities Commission member Ben Loyola (pictured above and featured in clip below) literally shat his pants when he saw a couple Mark Ryden paintings that were slated to be shown at the Virginia Beach Contemporary Art Show on May 21.

"Loyola is concerned that Ryden, in his work, pokes fun of religion."

“I am really not poking fun at religion. I am just looking at it in different ways,” Ryden said. “Someone ought to poke fun at those Christians, though.”

Wonder what Ben Loyola thinks about the Mel Gibson film Passion of the Christ? That shit was fucking brutal and makes Mark Ryden paintings look like fluffy bunnies in comparison. But that's a movie, and we're comparing apples to oranges there...

...so let's take a look at Caravaggio, an Italian painter from the 1600s who could rightly be described as a master:

Judith Beheading Holofernes by Caravaggio

The scene above is from the book of Judith, in the Old Testament. Notice the blood spewing from Holofernes' neck... pretty fucked up.

But that's nothing compared to ANOTHER widely recognized master: Hieronymous Bosch, who was a Dutch painter born in 1450. Bosch painted one of my all-time favorite paintings, a triptych, called the Garden of Earthly Delights:

The Garden of Earthly Delights is a giant painting in 3 parts, and it's hard to see the details here (just Google it). I'll show you a close-up:

The Garden of Earthly Delights is full of sex, people being eaten alive, sodomy and violence. And much more. It's a goddamned mess. It's been widely discussed, interpreted in various ways, studied, loved and hated. The point here is... how can we accept the Caravaggio piece or the Bosch piece as valid and important artwork, and then consider the Mark Ryden paintings as blasphemous?

Hypocrisy of the highest order!

Hi-Fructose has pointed out to me on Twitter that the show will not be censored and will run as planned, including the Ryden works. This guy Ben Loyola is sticking his uneducated foot in his own big mouth. He should thank the deity of his choice that such an all-star group of artists will be showing in his town. It's an impressive roster, by any measure. Ryden fits right in.

Support your local artist!

If you feel like expressing your disapproval or support to Ben Loyola, here's his contact info. We don't judge. But know that if you support censoring artwork based on your personal preferences, once you go down that rabbit hole, there's literally no form of self expression that's safe. Art, words, music... censor one for Puritanical reasons, and they all fall like dominoes.

May 12, 2016

32GB Mr.Sulu MIMOBOT®, a limited edition of just 1,000 hand-numbered pieces, joins Spock, Kirk, Picard and Data in MIMOBOT flash drive form and function. Sulu, the suave helmsman on the Enterprise as portrayed by actor George Takei in Star Trek: The Original Series, is brought to digital life in Mimoco's stylized MIMOBOT appearance, suited in Sulu's gold Enterprise command uniform. Sulu is a jack-of-all-trades who climbed the Starfleet ranks from lieutenant to captain, dabbled in botany and astrophysics, and now adds storing your data to his lengthy resume.

May 11, 2016

In the current day of 3D scanning and rapid output by companies like Hot Toys, it's always great to see amazing skills of a figure sculptor. Korean figure sculptor K.A.Kim (Kyung-ah Kim) has been doing some amazing work. One of her latest creations soon to be produced is Brad Pitt's character in Fight Club, Tyler Durden. Working with a 1/6 scale figure, there are currently 2 versions of the Fight Club character available for purchase. K.A. Kim hand sculpts the immense details for the masters, capturing every nook and cranny which will later be produced by Blitzway, a fairly young Korean manufacturing company. Currently, the Fight Club figures are up for pre-order on Blitzways website, priced at $249 each plus shipping(which is $20). Also available is a set option for both versions of the figures, but an additional costume will be included. Expected release is July 2016. For those interested in the sculpting process, K.A. Kim posted a few videos on her Social Media pages. Check out more pictures on the Fight Club figure product page, here.

May 10, 2016

VERY interesting..."...creators on Celery will be able to grow their community and reach new
audiences with Indiegogo InDemand, a vibrant community marketplace of
15 million early adopters and product enthusiasts. Much of the challenge
in bringing a creative endeavor to life comes from building an audience
from scratch. Now, building an audience with Celery through our
InDemand integration will be simple and seamless.For Indiegogo creators who have completed a crowdfunding campaign,
providing a storefront for customers has typically been time-consuming
to set up and painful to customize. Now, transitioning from a successful
Indiegogo campaign to their own pre-order store will be as easy as
adding a Celery pre-order button to their website."

May 9, 2016

"Next thing you know Japanese Toy companies, Western Graffiti artists,
Music Label owners and Streetwear hustlers all embrace in one sweaty
geek group hug and birth a new category of nerdy collectable that
references all the stuff that makes street culture cool and taps
directly into the Star Wars shaped hole left from selling all those
childhood toys: Urban Vinyl aka Designer Toys!"

Very cool show set to launch in NYC featuring 20 customized (painted and/or sculpted) All City Style trains by 20 students of High School of Art & Design in Manhattan (alma mater of Klim Kozinevich, founder of All City Style). Reception, auction and panel discussion by alumni graff artists!

A cold wind blows across the barren Norwegian countryside. The cackle of crows echoes through skeletal trees. Pale figures don robes of glass as their eyes and mouths recede into shadow. No words are uttered as crimson letters are scribed across the oath of the damned. We are three.

The Nordic Legion Alavaka will be available on May 13th in the DHP webshop. They will go on sale at 6PM (EST) and be priced at $60.00 each. Clear vinyl with black, red, white and metallic red paints. Charred brown gemstone eyes. Comes with black "heart" guts and wrapped sticks accessory. Made in Japan. Not intended for children under 14 years old. Also includes a copy of The Plagues "Epidemic" cd which was Devils Head Records number fourteen. *NOTE: While The Plague was NOT a Norwegian black metal band you can hear cues to the original Nordic Legion in both their lyrics and music.

SPECIAL 1 OFF HANDPAINTS

A couple 1 off Handpaints will also go on sale at the same time as the Nordic Legion Charred release. The ALAVAKA "Type D" and NORDIC LEGION BODHISATTVA "Converted" will both be available when the Charred release goes up. Priced at $100.00 each...get ready!

And don't forget...if you missed out on previous Alavaka releases you still have the opportunity to grab a couple. See below:

MICFITS x ALAVAKA

DHP has teamed up with the punk rock underground experience know as The Micfits to give you an awesome Disney themed treat. The Maleficent tribute features an Alavaka painted in metallic tones to mimic the classic villain from the 1959 animated feature Sleeping Beauty. Also included is the evil black raven (Diablo) who is Maleficent's confidante and assistant. Finally a set of two 5 x 7 inch prints featuring a Maleficent themed Micfits character accompanies the toy. There is also a secret evil chase version. Available in the Micfits webshop.

SCARECROWOVEN x ALAVAKA

DHP has teamed up with illustrator extraordinaire, Scarecrowoven to give you some awesome Alavaka packages. Both Dave (Scarecrowoven) and Toby (Devils Head Productions) did colorways of Alavaka on red and milky white marbled vinyl. An AMAZING Alavaka 5 color silkscreen print featuring glow in the dark ink and 7 color silkscreen tshirts are among the other goodies that will be part of the collaboration packages available in the DHP webstore. ONLY 1 TOY PACKAGE LEFT!